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- Misc Ramblings (16)
- Story Time (4)
- Thoughts on Things (27)
- Uncategorized (1)
- August 24, 2008: Faith
- August 23, 2008: To blog or not to blog
- August 13, 2008: Well Done!!!
- August 7, 2008: Oh yeah, my wife is pregnant
- July 22, 2008: I'm still here
- July 14, 2008: Turn the other cheek?
- July 8, 2008: Living with the Philistines
- July 4, 2008: Story time episode 2 Continued
- July 2, 2008: Story time episode 2
- June 30, 2008: Is Your Church Dark Enough?
Golden Compass vs The Church
I just finished reading an interview with Phillip Pullman, the author that wrote the series of books that begins with “The Golden Compass”. In it he says, “The power to send armies to war, to rule every aspect of our lives, to tell us what to wear, what to think, what to read–when religion gets hold of that, watch out! Because trouble will ensue.” The interviewer goes on to say that “Pullman sees himself as championing the universal human values of love and tolerance and curiosity.” As I read this I think about prayer and the Bible being removed from schools. Removing the Bible from schools sounds an awful lot like telling people what to read which Pullman says would be a danger of giving a religious person political power, yet this was done not by religious people, but by those with an any religious agenda. Furthermore, the removal of prayer from schools certainly doesn’t sound very tolerant, something Pullman considers himself a champion for. Now, Pullman does not specifically address these issues in the interview I read. I suppose it is possible that he might agree with me about the removal of prayer and the bible from schools.
Furthermore, I think that anyone in government getting what Pullman describes as, “The power to send armies to war, to rule every aspect of our lives, to tell us what to wear, what to think, what to read,” is dangerous. Certainly the president of the US has the power to send armies to war. However, I don’t think that any of the other powers that Pullman mentions here are given to anybody in our government. I think that our worlds history is full of examples of the danger of giving this kind of power to the government. In these cases, it was the abuse of power that caused the problems, not religion. Even if the leader as religious it was the abuse of power that caused the problem. Certainly the leaders religious beliefs may have had some influence on the ways in which he or she abused the power, but it was the abuse of power that caused the problem.
So, I find myself thinking, is Pullman really against religion, or Christianity; or is he actually against zealots with any agenda. If Pullman is truly a champion of “the universal human values of love and tolerance and curiosity,” then a zealot of any type, with any agenda would go against what he champions.
It is a shame that Pullman appears to have taken on organized religion in his stories. At this time I have not seen the movie, nor read the books. As such I can not make an intelligent opinion about either. So, all the opinions I expressed here are based on the interview I read. I do plan to see the movie, and may even read the books. I hope that the views of his story have been misrepresented in the stuff I have read so far, but I will reserve any opinions until I have seen the movie.